Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill has blamed "the intelligentsia" for all of Russia's misfortunes in the 20th-century.

Speaking to a meeting of the advisory board of the Patriarch's literature prize in Moscow on March 29, Kirill said the "meat grinder" of the 20th century was an "organic consequence of the terrible crimes that the intelligentsia committed against faith, against God, against their own people, against their own country."

The patriarch also lamented the ongoing "war of historical arguments" over the events of 1917, when the Russian monarchy was overthrown in February and a small group of Bolsheviks seized power in a coup in October.

"It is necessary to do everything to ensure that these differences do not incite new civic conflicts," Kirill said.

Speaking in February, Kirill described the events that overthrew the tsar as "a great crime."

"From these awful events of a century ago we must make one very important conclusion: we must redeem our sins and those of our ancestors through virtue," he said.